human-first in innovation

human-first in innovation

Thinking

Dec 19, 2017

Social Credits instead of money?

We usually refer to money to evaluate our wealth and so to measure how rich or poor we are. But is that the philosopher's stone?

By

Tommaso Martucci

A few weeks ago,
we landed a workshop on World
Usability Day in Hamburg. We worked using the Disney Creativity
Strategy, which is a 3-step process that Mr Walt Disney used to create his
stories… his dreams! And we envisioned of a future where social behaviour is
equally treated like or even valued over money.

We usually refer
to money to evaluate our wealth and so to measure how rich or poor we are. Why?
Because money is currently the primary and formalised “value of exchange“ in
the global economic system. Even though money is not what really makes us
“rich” as human-being, we usually refer to money because it is the „currency“
used to access services such as healthcare, education, insurance, etc.. By using
“money“ as a value of exchange, populations have developed into a “money-driven
culture” which has likely led to what we call “inequality“ among global
communities.

What does
inequality mean? By definition “inequality“ finds its roots in “disparity“ -
with a focus on social aspects- and “diversity“ which refers to the economic
aspects. So, you connect the dots and that‘s what we call a global
Socio-Economic system.

by Johnny Miller

The aerial picture
of Cape Town from the Unequal
Scenes Project by Johnny Miller is a visible result of disparity and
diversity, of a system that does not take into account the human values that
are important for human relationships. And so, some communities (on the left)
are included in the same system where other communities (on the right) are not
included.

Another
enhancement of inequality and disparity will or might be the rise of AI.
Without being too pessimistic about our future with AI, it’s obvious that sooner
or later a lot of automation-like and also more ambitious tasks, nowadays
performed by humans for money, will be outsourced to an artificial intelligence
which isn’t paid and leaves a certain amount of people without access to
billable day work. So, it’s definitely time to think about an alternative,
about another global currency than or in addition to traditional money.

At the present
time, we have the opportunity (and maybe also the obligation) to envision a
future which includes in its global socio-economic system our human values:
“how we act“, “how we behave“, so mostly “how we perform while relating to each
other“, which is the basic concept of the Social Credit Score (SCS) system.
Like paper-money which was first seen in ancient China, the SCS System was also
envisioned first in China. It was then adopted in the U.S. as Merit-Based
System (especially by Trump) to evaluate immigrants before releasing Visas. And
there are also similar programs in Canada and Australia. The SCS is an
experimental system, which will be launched in China by 2020 and some other
groups are taking its slow adoption into consideration.

How does it work?
It enables all people to get a „score“ -as citizens- from a Governmental system
based on many different trackable activities. However, it doesn’t yet allow
individuals to evaluate each other.

What’s next? So,
at the present, each of us owns a certain amount of money, but in the future,
we will probably also own a certain amount of points.

And now? A similar
concept is already somehow part of the same system in which we’ve lived until
now: we are evaluated for opening a bank account, as well to get a loan, we are
evaluated for renting a property (in Germany called Schufa), etc.. As for every
big topic, for some, it‘s a positive initiative, and for others, it might have
negative consequences. At the moment, we are not able to judge what hasn’t
happened yet. Instead, we can envision the values that will probably regulate
this possible scenario and how we will be able to evaluate each other based on
them. In fact, the Social Credit Score system can have multiple evolutions:

1

It could
compensate the lack of money - while empowering the economically poor. So,
we‘ll probably be able to purchase/acquire goods by paying partially with money
and with our SCS.EXAMPLE: Even
though someone would not be able to economically afford the access to
University, his or her SCS would automatically grant access to a scholarship
valuing your social performance in school.

2

It could grant
access to specific services - while limiting the power of money. We‘ll probably
have to reach a specific SCS-Score in society in order to unlock some goods.EXAMPLE: Even if
you have a billionaire budget to acquire a residence in a favoured area, you
would not be able to purchase it because your SCS-Score might be too low for
this particular community relying on something more than paper money.

3

It could
completely replace money - while privileging human-values. We will probably
live in a system that is more „social“ than „economic“.EXAMPLE: Maybe I
will be able to purchase an expensive visit to the doctor by paying with
SCS-Scores, and probably money would be erased or used only for specific
transactions.

These are just the
first ideas, we developed in our workshop. And worth a big thank you to our
dear participants, who contribute to the big question of our time, how to
tackle the challenges of a future where money might be not the only value. They
and we took the first step into a more human-first future.

Tommaso Martucci

Innovation & Design Manager

Tommaso Martucci is an Innovation & Design Manager at INDEED. He is specialized in Service, Ux/Ui & Innovation, with a background in Product Design and Workplace Strategy. Milan, London, Shanghai, Belgrade or Shenzhen are just some locations, where he proved his design versatility. Feel free to join his reading list by following #timeforreading on – actually – every known social media channel.